A word of warning: I'm not making this up.

It's a fold card with a lunch check on the front and a banner reading "There's no such thing as a free lunch". The check reads:

		Licenses	27
		Users   	63

		BSA Penalties	Up to $150,000 or More!

It goes on (once you unfold the card) with:

	Here's a tip: Double-check your software licenses today.
	(Or you may pick up the bill for big penalties tomorrow.)

		As a member of the high tech community, you may
		have already heard about how the Business Software
		Alliance (BSA) is working to put an end to illegal
		software usage.  What you may not know is that in
		Florida over 30% of business software applications
		are unlicensed.

	Software piracy is illegal.  And the BSA is cracking down.

		In an effort to protect intellectual property rights
		nationwide, the BSA is investigating organizations
		that use unlicensed software.  Companies found to
		be running unlicensed software could face penalties
		of as much as $150,000 for each program copied.
		So be sure to check that you have all the licenses
		you need.

	Sign up for a free software consultation and save up to 20%.

		To make it easy for you to check your software assets,
		we've teamed up with Zones to offer you a free, no-
		obligation software consultation.  If you find you
		need licenses, you'll receive up to 20% savings on
		Microsoft Windows upgrades and office products through
		the Microsoft Open License Program.  Just call Zones
		at 1-888-200-9062 or contact your authorized Microsoft
		reseller today and make sure you don't get stuck with
		a hefty bill for unlicensed software later.

Of course, there's the extra threat:

	"Unless you have no past or current unhappy employees, you're
	only one phone call away from being the target of a BSA
	investigation.  This is not a traffic ticket."
		- Bob Kruger, Vice President, Business Software Alliance

Some Observations

Given the implicit (and explicit) threats, it is obvious that there's a major scramble going on for cashflow through licensing- and a "cute" mechanism to force the latest software products on customers (it's not like you can still get NT 4.0 or 95/98 from Microsoft any more) so this move deals with multiple issues. (I wonder how many folks are circumventing the licensing issues since they can't buy a back-level version of Windows or Office any longer, and this is a way to avoid having to upgrade all of their hardware to handle newer stuff...)

Then there's the "Microsoft Open License Program" which carries an odd name- these kinds of licenses don't strike me as particularly "open". Microsoft? Open? Aren't those two words oxymoronic? Who are they trying to intimidate here? Do they think their business customers are all idiots? (Ummmmmm... maybe they do think...)

I suspect that any recipient of this little missive who DOESN'T call will get a visit. It's not like anybody will trust Zones (or whoever) to keep any information gathered confidential, since that'd make them an accessory to software piracy, right? Any small business owner/operator would, if they realized (or suspected) a shortfall in licenses, not be motivated to make it obvious by calling themselves in.

The timing of this whole debacle seems odd- c'mon, if there's one time that Microsoft would not want folks to look at Linux, this timing seems pre-ordained to have folks looking elsewhere.

Of course, when the BSA's (and we're not talking about the Boy Scouts here) jack-booted thugs (I couldn't resist that line...) come through your door to find you running Linux, they're gonna want to make sure you don't have Windows "hidden" in a dual (or triple) boot system. Of course, with what passes for my sense of humor, my LILO prompt goes "Win, Lose, Draw?" and I'm sure you folks know that Win will not start a Windows environment (back in the days on Windows 3.1 I used to go into C:WINDOWS and rename WIN.COM to LOSE.COM; When my co-workers saw me type it into the C: prompt, it usually got some chuckles).

More Fears...

I'm a paranoid. As a SysAdmin, my paranoia often goes up to 11. So, here's some more thoughts on licensing tricks I expect Microsoft to push out (kinda like "smart tags"):

• License Status provided in every E-mail header;
• License Expiration Dates in an HTML output file, were IE can see it and turn a blind eye to a document that has expired (or, more likely, sending a message to Microsoft pointing to the URL as being out of license compliance);
• Embedding expirations in Word, Excel, PowerPoint and other document files (kinda like MAC addresses and IP addresses, already in place) so that correspondence can provide evidence of whether the license is current and paid for (or, again, receiving apps will complain to Microsoft directly about receiving a document written with an out-of-license application). We can go further here with a refusal to deal with back-level software since those licenses will definitely be out of date.

With the desire to move towards a subscription-based mechanism, the little list I just put together may be insufficiently paranoid. I've seen other systems that are paranoid about license validity and check with a license server before they'll do any work; With an "always connected" InterNet, this kind of behavior can be much more widespread.

Then again, perhaps .NET is really just a mechanism to guarantee license compliance- which then suffered from "feature creep"...

A Call To...

Given Microsoft's application of pressure, this may be the best time to publicize their pamphlet and contrast the licensing there vs. the GPL, Artistic, BSD and other licenses.

Perhaps we need to copy their pamphlet's style (hopefully without a "Look and Feel" Lawsuit) and promote Linux to business users.

Hey, it's not like Linux-based apps are all that bad; sure, they don't have as many bells and whistles, but they will work for all but the most pathological office processes.

Finally, A Cute .sig

I saw this sig from a guy on the Linux for S/390 mailing list:

Unix:        Your gun, Your bullet, Your foot, Your choice.
M$-CE/ME/NT: Same as Unix, BUT: No choice, and We Aim Higher.